Every year millions of users (e.g., individuals, companies, and other institutions) receive, generate, and use reports from business entities. The reports provide a mechanism for the user to track and monitor the status of the business entity and make decisions regarding the status of the business entity. For example, the report may allow the user to project future growth and earnings, and appropriately allocate or reallocate finances, and provide information to co-owners and investors.
In order to generate and review a report, a user may use multiple applications. For example, a word processing application may be used to generate a cover letter, a financial application may be used to automatically track the finances of the business entity, and an image processing application may be used to create support pictures for the report. Thus, each application is a source for a document to insert into the report.
When reports are generated, reports must comply with a variety of requirements on the report. The requirements specify how the reports are presented. For example, the requirements may specify what data is to appear in the report and the particular layout of data in the report.